As Donald Trump’s win in the US Election 2016 wrapped up perhaps the most charged and unpredictable race in American history, fear rippled through the rest of the world over the impending uncertainty that his presidency would bring.
As America and the rest of the world reel in shock, let’s take a look at what President-elect Trump has said about Pakistan and Muslims in general, in the recent past.
Pakistan’s nuclear weapons a ‘vital problem’
During an interview with CNN anchor Anderson Cooper earlier this year, then-Republican frontrunner Trump termed Pakistan “a vital problem” for the US. “Because they have a thing called nuclear weapons” he said, adding, “They have to get a better hold of the situation.”
Tweet after Lahore blast
Following the suicide blast in Lahore which killed at least 74 people in March, Trump had tweeted: ‘I alone can solve’.
He had later explained his tweet saying, “When I see they [the attackers] put it [the bomb] in a park and there were mostly Christians although many others were killed…I think it is absolutely a horrible story.”
“But I am talking about radical Islamic terrorism. I will solve it better than anyone else running,” he had said.
Pull-back on aid
In 2011, NDTV reported that Trump had called for an immediate pull-back on aid to Pakistan unless it did away with its nuclear weapons.
“They are not friends of ours. (There are) plenty of other terrorists in Pakistan, we know that,” he had said.
Ban on Muslims
Trump has said he wants to ban foreign Muslims from entering the US, sparking criticism from all quarters, including fellow Republicans. He proposed the ban following the shooting in San Bernardino, California in December 2015.
“Donald J. Trump is calling for a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country’s representatives can figure out what is going on,” his campaign stated in a release at the time.
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Trump later toned down his stance, saying that the ban would be “temporary in nature”.
“It’s a temporary ban. It hasn’t been called for yet, nobody’s done it,” he said on Fox News Radio. “This is just a suggestion until we find out what’s going on.”
Trump reiterated the proposed ban after the massacre in Orlando, Florida earlier this year. “I called for a ban after San Bernardino and was met with great scorn and anger. But now … many are saying that I was right to do so. And although the pause is temporary, we must find out what is going on. We have to do it,” he said. “It will be lifted, this ban, when and as a nation we’re in a position to properly and perfectly screen these people coming into our country.
Khizr and Ghazala Khan
Trump’s campaign was again mired in controversy when he lashed out at Khizr and Ghazala Khan, the parents of US Army Captain Humayun Khan who was killed in Iraq.
At the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia, Khizr Khan had urged Trump to read the US Constitution and said to him: “You have sacrificed nothing and no one.”
Trump, in an interview to ABC later, said Khan’s wife Ghazala stood at his side during the speech and said nothing, suggesting that she was not allowed to speak.
Ghazala Khan, in an article for The Washington Post, responded that “when Donald Trump is talking about Islam, he is ignorant.”
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Pakistan-India relations
Recently Trump made a reference to Pakistan in response to a question asked by an Indian journalist that whether he would support Modi government’s action against Islamabad amid escalating cross-border tension.
To this Trump said: “Well, I would love to see Pakistan and India get along, because that’s a very, very hot tinderbox…. That would be a very great thing. I hope they can do it.”
He added he would be happy to ‘mediate’ between the two neighbours to defuse the situation.
